


In My Mind

by Drake_Rhapsody



Category: InuYasha - A Feudal Fairy Tale
Genre: AU, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Jaeger Pilots, Kaiju invasion, Minor Character Death, Not a Crossover, Pacific Rim AU, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-24
Updated: 2017-07-03
Packaged: 2018-11-18 11:14:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,368
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11289582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drake_Rhapsody/pseuds/Drake_Rhapsody
Summary: "I am going to die. I don't know if it's because of the blood loss, but it doesn't sound so terrible after all… I'll get to see Okaa-san again. There goes the survivor in me, I guess I'm tired of fighting. I can't move, I can hardly breathe and, definitely, I'm tired of surviving." Pacific Rim AU. More tags comming as the story goes...





	1. Prologue: Memento Mori

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I own nothing. Not even the chapter titles, wiser men than me said those phrases long, long ago. And Inuyasha belongs to Rumiko Takahashi and Pacific Rim is Guillermo del Toro’s. So, I own nothing.  
> Remember also that English is not my mother tongue, so I need you to review about any mistake you find… and if you are so kind to leave your opinion it would be great!  
> Welcome again! I call myself Drake Rhapsody and I would like to show you…

** In My Mind **

** Prologue: _Memento mori_ **

_I’m sure you’ve heard about us._

_Well, not us meaning me and my partners. I mean us as part of the_ Jaeger Program _._

 _Does that ring any bells? Well, it should. We fought a war that was finally won against all odds. We –meaning, of course, the members of the Hong Kong Shatterdome, I wasn’t even born back then– defeated a level 5_ Kaiju _and closed the Breach. For good._

_All hail agents Mori and Becket for their courage and good work. All hail Marshal Pentecost and Pilot Hansen for his heroic sacrifice. All hail every fucking member of that fucking shatterdome._

_After that… after all the shit and all the death and all the effort and all the rejection from every side… The Government chose to say that they had believed in us all the time._

_What a pile of bullshit._

Kaiju _were soon forgotten, as well as the_ Jaegers _and their crews. They became action figures and plush toys and cartoon characters. I’ve even watched a few porn movies starring our heroes. Yeah, scream at me, call me pervert; go see if there’s any fuck left for me to give._

_And so, no-one was ready when, fifty years after that heroic act, when none of our heroes were alive… the Breach opened again, and so begun the second war to protect a world that would rather explode than helping us save everybody’s asses._

_Well, I’m not going to spoil the end for you, though it seems pretty clear to me now. All the fucking alarms are ringing and my partner isn’t responding. Water is leaking in, our_ Jaeger _is fucked up beyond repair and…_

_Well._

_I guess you would want to know the whole story before knowing the end. It seems awfully fitting at the moment; it would be a really good recap of my shitty life before I kick the bucket._

_Let me start telling you all about the day the Pacific Rim opened again…_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -Memento mori = "Remember you'll die"


	2. Chapter I: Quotidie Morimur

** Chapter I: _Quotidie morimur_ **

_Everything here is beeping or screeching like crazy. It’s worsening my headache and hurting my ears._

_I can’t move. I’m pretty sure I’ve hit my head really hard, or else I wouldn’t be talking alone as I’m doing right now. My helmet is still whole so if it’s a concussion it would be mild. What really concerns me is the effort is taking me to breathe properly._

_Am I really talking? I mean… out loud? I guess not… My mouth is so dry even the taste of blood on my tongue is like swallowing sand, and I don’t feel it moving._

_Forgive me, I was going to tell you all about my fucked up life so you could understand what I am doing inside this wreckage of a_ Jaeger _(aside from obviously dying)._

 _Well, the first_ Kaiju _showed its ugly mug at the coast of Chiba’s Prefecture, where my mother and I were living…_

* * *

 

 

It all started with a low rumble that seemed to come from the ocean. All became suddenly silent, even the birds seemed to forget how to sing.

There was a little figure standing on the beach, the waves bathing his feet. Golden eyes searched the horizon as tiny dog ears listened to the unexpected silence, moving atop his head like white furry radars.

He sniffed around and only the salty smell of the sea filled his nostrils. Well, and also the stench of smoke and crude oil from the nearby factory. They had been lucky that it only reeked when the wind blew from the north.

His left ear twitched, hearing soft footsteps over the sand.

“What are you doing there, my little sentry?” a woman’s voice asked from behind him. Pale arms slipped out of the _kimono_ sleeves and embraced his bony shoulders from behind.

“Something’s wrong” he stated, and he continued staring at the horizon intently.

The woman tightened her grip around him, pressing a kiss to his temple.

“What do you see?”

“Nothing” he answered, frowning. “I heard a growl, like when the sea is angry… but it’s not taking back its waves.”

“So it’s not a _Tsunami_ ” she muttered, knowing her son’s keen hearing would catch that.

“Nu-uh” he shook his head, white bangs tickling his face and his neck. “It sounded more like something’s breaking.”

The woman watched the ocean once again, slightly worried.

“Do you hear it now?”

The kid shook his head again, still trying to win some short of staring contest with the horizon. He was so tense that the woman couldn’t help it; moving her hands to his sides, she poked him.

He didn’t yelp. He could swore it and punch in the gut anyone who say otherwise. No, definitely he didn’t yelp. Nor squirmed. And the redness of his face was due to sunburn.

The woman smiled softly and repeated the motion, obtaining yet another cry from her child.

“Sorry baby. Did I startle you?” she planted a kiss on her son’s still round cheek, being instantly shoved away by the kid.

“Mom!” he growled, whipping his face with the sleeve of his red oversized _haori_. “I told you I’m not a baby!”

“Sure you aren’t” she smiled, and her arms returned to their previous position, hugging the kid to her stomach, his pointy ears almost reaching under her breasts. The kid leaned back, still pouting.

“I’m turning six next April, I’m not a baby anymore…” he muttered, and his mother smiled softly.

“Inuyasha, you’ll always be my baby, even when you turn two hundred and twenty six.” The woman chuckled, starting to make her way home –if you could call the small refuge within the broken entrails of a wrecked _Jaeger_ home–. “Don’t take too long, sweetie, dinner will be ready in no time.”

He was about to answer when suddenly a gush of wind passed through them, making his every hair stand on end.

His brow framed his eyes, making them small as he tried to see farther into the skyline.

Then, he heard it again.

 “Mom…” he whispered, reaching for his mother’s _kimono_ , but she was no longer by her side, her human ears not hearing anything strange.

The rumble had reminded him of a _tsunami_ but, as he said before, the sea wasn’t backing away.

And he was pretty sure the thing that was disturbing the horizon wasn’t a giant wave.

He took one step back, taking his bare feet away from the water. Then, as the outline of eight gigantic legs started to make itself clear against the blue sky, he took another. And another.

And finally, when the wind brought to his sharp ears the noise of something splitting the waters as it went to the shore, he turned tail and ran, his long white hair waving behind him.

“Mom!”

The woman turned towards him with a smile.

“What’s it, sweetie?” she asked.

Then, she saw it.

“Oh my God” she breathed.

The kid was by her side an instant later but it already felt too late for her. Almost crushing him to her, she hugged him before taking his tiny hand and pulling him after her.

“Come, sweetie” she urged. “We have to leave now!”

The kid looked at her as if she had lost her mind; they had found the _Jaeger_ wreckage barely a month ago. Why were they leaving their new home so soon?

Besides, what about all their things?

“But…!” he tried to protest, but his mother yanked his arm, forcing him to run faster.

“Now, Inuyasha!” she shouted, and that was the first time the kid had seen his mother so scared.

And they ran. His short legs couldn’t follow his mother’s longer strides and, after he stepped on the hem of his oversized _haori_ for the fourth time, the woman lifted him up and carried him all the way to the village never minding his claims of being old enough to run for himself.

The alarms went off as they reached the first houses, so loud the kid had to cover his sensitive ears, burying his face on his mother’s shoulder.

The creature was on the beach. And his roar shook the entire place in a way that was much worse than any _tsunami_.

“ _KAIJU_!” someone shouted; someone who clearly remembered what had happened fifty years ago. “Run to the shelters!! Run for your lives!!”

But it was too late for that.

The first building to collapse blocked the entrance to the _Kaiju_ shelter, unused since that attack fifty years ago. Chaos took over as thousands of people almost stepped on each other’s heads while trying to escape.

The creature bellowed again and rammed into another building, sending debris and stone everywhere. Soon, the streets were so destroyed no-one could leave using any vehicle.

And the woman carrying the kid ran across all that chaos, trying desperately to find a safe place to hide, because leaving the city was no longer an option.

“Mom, behind us!” the kid cried, and his mother gripped him tighter and ran, ran, ran, as fast as she could, dodging the panicked citizens and leaping over what looked like dead bodies.

There wasn’t space on her mind to help anyone. She would have stopped if she was alone but her son’s weight on her arms, his tiny figure wrapping around her in fear, was a constant reminder of what was important. Not that she needed a reminder of that.

“Mom!!” the kid suddenly screamed, higher than the times before and definitely more terrified.

The earth quacked and her foot got caught mid jump on a fallen street lamp. Both of them fell head over heels, only a big block of cement stopping their fall. Quickly recovering, the woman all but jumped behind the debris, holding his kid to her.

And then…

Silence.

No screams, no buildings falling down, no bellows or earthquakes…

The woman held her breath and peeked from the corner of the cement block.

There was the monster, or at least what little part of it she could see among all the chaos and dust.

It was… listening.

As if it was looking for something.

And then a silent weep of fear echoed in the silence like a loud cry. The woman covered his son’s mouth swiftly, but the damage was already done: the beast jerked its head upwards and then _jumped_ ; Now she could see the entire form of the _Kaiju_ : it had the shape of an immense spider, its skin pitch black with glowing lines of dark purple travelling across its long legs, its head and its body. Hundreds of red eyes searched the debris for its prey. When its horrid mouth opened, showing sharp appendages dripping with poison, it looked like a sick grin.

Luckily, it hadn’t seen them.

Yet.

The woman felt the terrified scream of his son, muffled by the palm of her hand, and felt the tears fall from his eyes and into her fingers. She would have screamed too, but her throat was paralyzed with fear. Her brain, however, was operating at its top capacity while the woman searched around for somewhere to hide, a crack, a hole, a cave, anything…

And then she saw it: a crevice between two collapsed buildings, big enough for a child to hide in.

“Inuyasha…” she muttered, but her son didn’t hear her. “Inuyasha!” she tried again, and this time her kid’s golden eyes locked with hers, panic painted in his features like a mask. “Look…”

Her finger pointed at the crevice. At first, the boy gazed at her with a blank expression, but then he understood; a shudder ran up his little body and more tears came. The kid shook his head and hid his face on her shoulder, gripping her neck so tightly it almost hurt.

“N-no…” she heard him cry. “No, Mom, no…”

“You’re little… it won’t catch you…” she tried to reason with him, but it was impossible.

And the monster was closer each passing moment.

The woman hugged his son and slowly stood up, caressing his silver hair, his tiny dog ears, his rounded cheeks…

“Forgive me, my son…” she breathed in his ear.

And she ran towards the crevice.

“NO!”

The monster saw them instantly; a bellow erupted behind her and she knew her minutes were numbered. And it wasn’t a big digit.

The first thump of one of the immense legs almost hit her, sending her tumbling to the side and into the hood of a wrecked car. She yelped in pain but straightened herself fast and continued her suicidal race to the crevice.

The second hit actually got her there, throwing her into the building. Her back collided first with a revolting crack and then she fell to the ground in a heap, still shielding her son’s little body.

And that was as far as she went.

“Mom!!” her son cried from under her, but she couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe. “Mom, get up, GET UP!!”

Somehow, he managed to turn her onto her back, trying unsuccessfully to lift her unresponsive arms. She looked into his eyes, those beautiful golden eyes.

She wanted to tell him a lot of things; that she loved him, that she will always protect him, no matter what. That he had been her only treasure, her blessing, her compass. She wanted to, but…

“Go…” she managed to wheeze.

And then her eyes were glassy and it was as if all lights went out.

 “MOM!!!!!!!!!”

The cry of grief that erupted from the little kid’s mouth got lost within the roar of the monster; the _Kaiju_ was running to them – _him_ –, and his own self-preservation drove him inside the little crevice, making himself smaller enough to fit. He barely could see anything from inside, but what little was there to see was never registered by the boy’s brain; his mother’s pale arm was the only thing he could focus on, facing upwards, fingers slightly curled up, unmoving.

Dead.

There wasn’t time to weep, because the next thing he saw was that same hand being lifted from the ground, dangling from the mouth appendages of the monster.

Blood splattered all around as the _Kaiju_ ’s jaws closed themselves with a sickening crunch.

Bile rose to his throat, knotting itself there with the scream that had already wanted out. On his hands and knees, he heaved once, twice… and then emptied the whole contents of his stomach on the ground.

He heard the beast gulping and couldn’t avoid another violent wave of nausea, but there wasn’t anything left in him to throw up. His eyes were so full of tears he couldn’t see a thing, and his blood was rushing to his ears, blocking every sound. Even his nose was useless now that she could only smell dust and blood and death and…

And gunpowder.

Someone was shooting.

The beast growled and moved somewhere far from his hiding place. Not that he cared about it anymore; if he were to die that day, at least he could be with his mother.

The sound of heavy machinery surrounded him. He had seen old panzers from the Second World War, but only in an exposition that was held in Tokyo a few months ago. The sound of those heavy tanks moving sounded completely alien to his ears.

He was too little to understand it, but he was going into shock.

Surprisingly, he didn’t care about soldiers finding him there. He felt cold and dizzy, and he only wanted to curl up into a tight ball and disappear from sight. And that he did.

It wasn’t after hours later, when the _Kaiju_ was far up north the island with all the military forces of Japan following closely trying to take it down, when some scavengers made their way to the tiny crack, pulling an unconscious kid from it.

An unconscious kid with long silver hair and white furry dog ears.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quotidie morimur = from the phrase Quotidie morimur, quotidie conmutamur et tamen aeternos esse nos credimus, that means “Every day we die, every day we change, and despite that, we believe ourselves to be eternal”. It’s another point of view about the memento mori motto.


	3. Chapter II: Extra Viam

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I intend to update every Monday, but I might not be able to do it always… for example, this week I’m not at home and, even if I have my computer with me, I might not have the time to write anything. Besides, it’s so damn hot in my country right now and heat turns me into a lazy sloth begging for some cool air…

** Chapter II: _Extra viam_ **

**Beep. Beep. Beep.**

_Fuck, my ears… There’s another alarm going off._

_What is it this time? We lost all connections to the Shatterdome fifteen minutes ago._

**Oxygen main. Right hemisphere: critical levels. Operating at 20% of capacity.**

_Oh, great. As if I hadn’t enough trouble breathing already…_

_Are you still there? Wow, I’m surprised. I thought even my recently discovered imaginary friend would want to turn tail and run away from here as fast as they could. Not that I could blame you if you do it now…_

_It’s good to know that I’m not going to die alone._

_Anyway, what was I saying?_

_Oh yeah the story of my life… I’m going to skip a couple of decades if you don’t mind; suddenly I don’t feel like I have much time…_

 

* * *

 

Inuyasha woke up to the sound of the alarm clock mixing together with his nightmare. Shooting and arm out, he all but squashed the snoozer, shattering it to pieces, and rose to his feet, founding himself standing in the middle of the small room. Breath coming in and out in short pants, he blinked a few times, swallowing the lump in his throat as he slowly realized where he was.

“Fuck” he said when his weary eyes caught sight of the broken device on the floor.

Slumping back onto the mattress, the young man grasped his white sleeveless shirt and pulled it away from his chest to cool off his sweat drenched torso. It was a futile act, as the air around him was already much too hot and damp for his liking.

God, how he missed winters…

“Fucking heat…” he mumbled, as he felt his bangs sticking to his forehead.

His heart was still beating like crazy. It would be completely calm within the next five minutes, but that wasn’t the main problem; He hated when old memories came back to haunt him while he was enjoying the only moment of peace he could normally have. Those memories assaulted him in his sleep and circled his head for whole days after, sometimes even weeks, leaving a dull ache in his chest and weariness of mind and body.

He cursed again, scratching his right collarbone where bedbugs had bitten him that night; his life was hard enough without the unease his nightmares caused.

After a few minutes of calming himself, he rose again and kneeled on the floor, rummaging inside his bag-pack for a dry shirt.

“Not that it’s going to remain dry much longer” he muttered to himself. “Fucking humidity…”

He came across a large piece of red fabric he hadn’t used since he arrived at that boiler of a country, a few weeks ago. Slowly, he pulled it out to spread it by its long sleeves. After watching the garment for a few seconds, scanning it for any signs of moth bites or damage, he folded it neatly and left it on the mattress behind him. It wasn’t as if that was normal fabric, but being his most precious treasure one could never be careful enough.

The next thing that came out was a metallic chain with two dog-tags dangling from it. In one of them, split in four columns, said:

// TAISHO, I. // 4***** // AB+ // NO PREFERENCE //

The other one, in only three columns, stated:

// PILOT // RIGHT HEMISPHERE // STEEL FANG

These, he thought with a touch of melancholy in his golden eyes, were something he hadn’t worn in a very, very long time…

A hard knock on his door took him out of his nostalgic state.

“ _¡Hora de trabajar, mestizo!_ ” shouted a harsh voice.

Inuyasha bit his tongue hard enough to draw blood and breathed through his nose heavily; it wouldn’t do any good to him to punch someone’s face so early in the morning.

“ _¡Ya voy!_ ” he shouted back, instead.

It didn’t matter how many times and in how many languages people called him a “half-breed”, one does not simply get used to it.

More out of reflex than anything else, Inuyasha put the chain around his neck, ditched his damp shirt and took another out of his bag. Swiftly, he threw the covers he never used over the bed and rearranged his pack as if he were to leave that place that same day.

“Keh, I wish.” He grunted at that thought.

Stealing a quick glance at himself in the shard of mirror hanging on a nail on the wall, he did his best not to look as someone who has just woken up and exited his small assigned room. The rest of the workers slept together in barracks, but no-one wanted to share a roof with a demon, let alone a half-demon.

Well, at least it gave him some short of privacy along the night.

The damp heat of the Gulf of Mexico slapped him in the face as soon as he opened the door.

“Fucking humidity” he cursed; it wasn’t the first time and it wouldn’t be the last.

…

Rebuilding the Anti- _Kaiju_ Wall using the materials left from another much older wall that some madman had tried to raise between Mexico and the United States of America was a big-ass irony, an unappreciated work and a life-risking way to earn money. That’s why he was there, up above on the higher rafters, where no-one else dared to climb, welding together beam after beam of forged steel; he was a big fan of ironies, he didn’t need much money to survive and if he fell, his demon blood could take the fall. If not… well, it was not as if someone would care.

Sweating like a pig, Inuyasha lifted his welder’s mask and stood up, cursing the weather again. He stretched his back until his spine made a loud pop and grunting with satisfaction looked to the sea below the Wall, resting his eyes for a bit before continuing his work.

There was no longer beaches on that part of the continent, all of them being occupied with the massive wall that was supposed to protect humankind.

That had been _Project Jaeger_ ’s mission since that fateful day in Japan, nearly fifty years ago. They had implemented the gigantic robots, improving the synchronization between pilots and machines, making the connection stronger and more powerful. Scientist discovered soon that demon’s minds were more resistant than human’s, but also found _youkai_ were hardly trusted with the _Jaegers_ by their own, for the neural load was too great even for them; many _youkai_ died during the first years of the second invasion, either from exhaustion or from their own powers unbalance, a common reaction to such an invasion of the mind. Regarding those problems and the recently discovered compatibility between human’s and demon’s minds a new program was born: the _Yokai-Ningen Jaeger Initiative_ (Y.N.J.I.) saw the light for the first time ten years after the Tokyo tragedy, and it came from that same Shatterdome. For nearly twelve years, this initiative took the upper hand against the invasive forces. Demons and humans worked together all over the world. To do so, demons had to uncover themselves, revealing humans the big secret their existence was. At first all went well.

At first.

...

A siren rang along the Wall, announcing the end of his shift. Inuyasha gathered his tools ad jumped from rafter to rafter until he reached the ground, flexing his knees a little to absorb the impact. The rest of the workers had to rappel down, wasting much more time.

He honestly was glad for that; by the time they reached the cafeteria he would have finished eating and went up the beams to avoid all human contact.

The main reason the Y.N.J.I. didn’t had the Government support was because of the human inability to work with other species. And the demons weren’t saints either; there had been as much animosity from one side as from the other.

And so, although he heard that the Y.N.J.I. was somehow still working, everybody knew it was fated to extinction.

Inuyasha was reaching the cafeteria when someone called him:

“ _¡Eh, mestizo, alguien pregunta por ti!_ ”

He turned his head ready to bite off the head of whoever it was, but the second part of the phrase sunk into him before he could do anything.

“ _¿Quién?_ ” he asked, and the human simply motioned towards the foreman’s cabin.

There were two figures at the door, talking.

One of them was the foreman, he knew him well.

The other…

Despite the smell of fried food, he could notice the scent of this new person… who –if his nose wasn’t failing him– wasn’t new at all.

He went to them and, ignoring the foreman, faced directly the small old woman with the black eyepatch.

“Kaede” he called in Japanese, knowing none of the presents but her knew the language. “What the fuck are you doing here?”

The woman stared at him with a hint of disapproval on her only eye:

“I see that you have yet to learn how to behave politely.” She answered in English. “You haven’t changed one bit in thirty years.”

He snorted and spoke again, switching to English too:

“I can’t say the same. I wouldn’t have recognized you if not for your scent. You look like Baba Yaga.”

The foreman was about to scold him for such insult, but Kaede raised a hand:

“It’s ok, Mr. Gómez. We’ve known each other for many years. I know how to deal with him”

“If you say so…” the man replied, not quite sure himself. “I’ll leave you two to talk. _Inuyasha, tienes que estar en tu puesto a las tres en punto_.”

Inuyasha watched him leave for a moment and then turned his gaze towards the old woman.

“Are you going to answer me, _baba_?” he demanded. A fang peeked from under his slightly raised lip, a signal that he was annoyed.

“It’s good to see you too, Inuyasha” she smiled as if the man in front of her hadn’t just insulted her. “You were extremely difficult to find.”

He stared into her good eye, his jaws set. Clearly, he didn’t want that reunion to be a friendly conversation.

Kaede sighed and shook her head.

“Okay, we’ll do it your way, straight to the point… We need you back in the Tokyo Shatterdome.”

Inuyasha gave her a twisted grin that resembled more a grimace:

“Why? Are you short of freaks?”

Kaede ignored that comment. Instead, she pulled a small notebook from her handbag:

“According to my notes, you were one of the first pilots of the _Youkai-Ningen Jaeger Initiative_ , but before that you worked as a mechanic at Tokyo Shatterdome…”

“According to your… You were actually there, Kaede!”

“… and you are now fluent in Japanese, English, Spanish, Russian, Korean and French. Is that correct?”

“Who the fuck told you that?”

Kaede closed the notebook and stared at him with the same expression a mother scolding his insolent child should have:

“Just answer, Inuyasha: Is that correct?”

His ears flattened to his head and he lowered his gaze, acting like said insolent child after being scolded:

“… yes.”

“Good.” The old woman put her notebook in her handbag again. “I hope you’ll tell me in our way to Japan how you managed to learn so many languages.”

“Long story short, I had plenty of time and very little to do. And I’m not coming with you, _baba_.”

He wasn’t looking at her, jaws set and brow knitted. Sighing one more time, Kaede raised a hand to his shoulder, trying to catch his attention:

“Inuyasha…”

But the half-demon shrugged her hand away and crossed his arms in a way that was more defensive than angry, shoulders raised and head lowered.

“Why should I? I’m needed here.” He answered, reverting back to Japanese.

“Both you and I know that’s a lie.”

Maybe it was the fact that Kaede spoke in their mother language for the first time, maybe it was something that had to come out eventually, but Inuyasha felt that he had to say more:

“Why do you need me back there? I’m not getting inside one of those blasted machines ever again.”

“Still, you’re the only one I could contact from back then.”

Wrong phrase; if there were any chances of convincing him, they went out of the proverbial window. His eyes harbored for just a second something raw, hurt, and then the wall was up again, staring at her from the bottom of those golden pools.

“So I wasn’t even your first choice… how fucking fitting…”

“After what happened, can you really blame me?” she countered, keeping a calm voice. “Besides, you disappeared. We found _Fang’s_ wreckage on some beach in South Korea. I must confess believing you were dead was the easiest thing to do at the moment. And thirty years after, we see a photograph of the builders of the Wall in Russia and you’re there, as if the time didn’t have passed for you. You haven’t changed one bit since We first met.”

He grimaced again:

“I knew I should have refused to be in that photograph…” he muttered dryly.

He turned his head away from her, looking to the Wall like it was the most interesting thing on the world. Meanwhile, she looked at him from her smaller height, from his furry ears to his battered old trainers, stealing a glance at the dog-tags that dangled from his neck. Knowing perfectly well what they were, Kaede smiled fondly:

“I know why you don’t want to come back. Trust me, I understand.” She whispered softly. He didn’t give any signals of having heard her, but she knew him all too well to know he had. “There’s few people back there who actually remember what happened, and all of them want you there as much as I do.”

His eyes lit up with a glimmer of despair:

“I didn’t…” he started to say, but Kaede cut him off.

“You have been running well enough on your own, Inuyasha, but you can’t outrun memories. Maybe it’s time to face your demons.”

He shot a dirty look her way, truly angry this time:

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

“Our world is dying.” Kaede stated, ignoring his harsh question. “We’ve been fighting the inevitable for too long, but we are not ready to give up, not yet. I remembered you to be the kind of person who’d rather go down fighting than die hiding. Maybe I was mistaken. Maybe you did change after all.”

Her hand reached to touch the dog-tags, making them rattle against each other. Then, she bowed slightly.

“I wish you the best, Inuyasha. I truly do.” She said, this time in English.

And she turned away, leaving behind her a very confused half-demon, a futile wall and too many painful memories.

Hours after, a _Y.N.J.I._ jet-plane was waiting for her on the small airport.

Kaede hated flying with passion, but she had to be the one doing that meeting: not many people in the Tokyo Shatterdome remembered Inuyasha, and the ones who did were needed back there. She was also, as the Marshal in charge of the place, but it simply had to be her. It always had to be her. That was the main reason of her grey hair and her old bones; despite being only two years left to her sixties, she looked and felt much older.

She had truly believed that, despite all they had been through, she would be able to bring Inuyasha back.

The old woman sighed and put her small wheeled suitcase on the metal detector to pass the checkpoint. She’d been so convinced…

Suddenly, a loud voice made her turn around as fast as her old bones permitted:

“Wait!” Running down the corridors, followed closely by a couple of very confused policemen, still in his working clothes and with a really old bag-pack weighing right shoulder, came Inuyasha. When one of the policemen managed to grab him by his arm, he yanked it free with a growl. “ _Voy con ella. ¡Que voy con ella, joder! ¡Déjenme pasar!_ ”

“He’s with me, agent!” she said in English, and waited on the other side of the control as the half-demon presented his ID card and passport.

The smile she sported by the time he passed his bag across the detector couldn’t be dampened by the frown he had on his face.

“Don’t say a fucking word, old hag” he spat.

And they both got into the jet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -Extra viam = from the phrase "bene curris sed extra viam", that means “you ran well but you are out of the path”.  
> -¡Hora de trabajar, mestizo! = Spanish for “Time to work, Half-breed!”  
> -¡Ya voy! = Spanish for “I’m coming!”  
> -¡Eh, mestizo, alguien pregunta por ti! = Spanish for “Oi, Half-breed, someone’s asking for you!”  
> -¿Quién? = Spanish for “Who?”  
> -Baba Yaga = a witch from Russian folklore.  
> -Baba = also “baba” means something like “old hag” in Japanese.  
> -Voy con ella. ¡Que voy con ella, joder! ¡Déjenme pasar! = Spanish for “I’m with her. I said I’m with her, fuck! Let me pass!”


	4. Chapter III: In Situ

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I find it quite strange that no-one has anything to say… no reviews, no opinions, no impressions, no corrections… I’m almost afraid to ask but here it goes… Am I doing it wrong or something? Maybe it is too soon to ask, what do you think? It’s kind of frustrating to try and write something in a language that isn’t mine and not receiving any type of feedback… I don’t want the reviews to figure on some kind of top ten lists of most reviewed fics or something like that, I need them to improve, I swear!  
> Anyway, Thanks to supadupasonic and Undaunted One for the follow!

** Chapter III: _In situ_ **

_That fucking monster tore away our_ Jaeger _’s right limb like it was nothing, like a kid ripping apart a fucking teddy bear. I think my arm is broken._

_Yup, most likely broken; I can barely wiggle my fingers. Actually, I can barely move the rest of my body, so that proves nothing._

_OW!_

_Note to self; never try to shake a limb you think is broken: it’s painful as hell._

_Then again, it was effective; now I know for sure it’s broken._

_Fuck._

 

* * *

 

 

The flight was long, but Inuyasha was used to sleeping anywhere; he made himself comfortable on his seat and spent the whole trip curled up and snoring lightly. Kaede woke him up half an hour before landing to instruct him about the Tokyo Shatterdome:

“When we arrive, it would be best if you speak always in English, even with me or other Japanese people. There are a lot of foreigners that work there, and it would be very rude if…”

“I remember that rule from last time, _baba_ ” he cut her off, highlighting the Japanese word on purpose. “I ain’t stupid.”

“I never said you were” she answered dryly. “I know you, Inuyasha, even if thirty years have passed.”

He lowered his gaze to the views outside the tiny window.

There it was, the Shatterdome: a gigantic construction built to harbor at least a dozen _Jaegers_ full prepared for the battle. The Tokyo Shatterdome hadn’t been one of the biggest during the first war against _kaiju_ , but it was the only one left; Hong Kong, Alaska, San Francisco, Sydney… all those shatterdomes were either abandoned and demolished or destroyed by _kaiju_ along the years that followed the second opening of the Breach.

Only the one in Tokyo remained intact.

“How many _Jaegers_ do we have?” he asked. “I don’t see much movement down there…”

“I’m afraid we only have five.”

“Five?” he let his head fall against the glass with a deep sigh. “We’re beyond fucked, then.”

“I should disapprove your language… but yes, we are indeed fucked.”

He couldn’t help but give the old woman a lopsided grin.

…

A brown-haired man was waiting for them at the tarmac, wearing a black jacket and a dark purple shirt. When Kaede got down the plane, he smiled warmly and went to retrieve her suitcase.

“Welcome back, Marshal Kaede” he greeted. “I hope your travel was successful.”

“Oh, it was, Miroku, it was…” she accepted the hand the man was lending her and patted it. Then, she turned back to the jet. “Inuyasha! Come down and say hi!”

“I’m not a damn kid, _baba_!” the half-demon came down the stairs adjusting his bright red _haori_. That was, with a plain white _kosode_ underneath, the only thing “traditional” he wore, and even these were held in place by a leather belt instead of an _obi_ ; he had long since changed the _hakama_ and traditional sandals for space blue cargo pants and black soldier boots. His dog-tags dangled outside the _haori_ and his bag-pack rested all its weight on his right shoulder. The cool wind brushed his long silver hair as he made his way to Kaede and the man, who was gawking at his ears, surprise printed in his blue eyes. “Take a goddamn picture, will ya?” he barked.

The man shook his head and smiled apologetically, recovering his professionalism.

“My apologies, how rude of me…” he lent him his right hand. “I’m Miroku, J-Tech Chief and Local Command Center.”

Instead of shaking it in a polite display of western tradition, Inuyasha stared at the hand, intentionally mimicking the way Miroku had gaped at him seconds before.

“The fuck happened to your hand?” he rudely asked, eyeing the bandages that covered it, leaving only the fingers bare.

The smile dropped slightly from the man’s face as Miroku closed his hand and let it dangle by his side.

“ _Kaiju_ -blue” he simply said. “I have a hole in my palm the size of a ping-pong ball. If I can give you a piece of advice, stay away from any spill; it corrodes flesh like acid.”

“I’m not so stupid as to put my hand on a fucking puddle of _Kaiju_ -blue” he blurted, and simply walked away from the man to the main building.

Miroku watched him go and then turned to Kaede, who was rubbing the bridge of her nose while shaking her head in discontent.

“Is he always like that?”

“Worse” she muttered. “He is the most stubborn person I’ve ever met. Go get him or he’ll end up angering someone.”

Nodding thoughtfully, Miroku took a quick glance at his right hand and speeded up his pace to reach the new guy.

“So, Mr. Inuyasha…” he said.

“Inuyasha is just fine.” The half-demon replied without sparing a glance at him.

“Inuyasha it is, then” Smiled Miroku. “I’ve been said that you’ve been here before…”

“Yep”

“May I ask how long ago?” Inuyasha wasn’t looking at him, so he missed the glint of suspicion in his blue glare.

“Thirty years, why?” He turned his head to look at his interlocutor but he found none; Miroku had stopped in his tracks to look at him amazed.

“So it’s true…” the J-Tech Chief marveled. “You are _The Inuyasha_ …”

Oh, fuck.

That guy had heard of him. Oh, God-fucking-dammit.

The half-demon shifted his weight from one leg to the other and tried with all his might to keep a straight face.

“Did you truly do it?” he flinched at the question; Kaede had said no-one knew what had happened thirty years ago…

_Ok man, just breathe. He hasn’t said anything yet…_

 “Did what?” he answered, praying his gruff voice didn’t give up on him. Maybe it wasn’t the ideal time to play dumb…

“Defeat _Onigumo_!” Inuyasha never thought an answer could make him feel so relieved. His shoulders relaxed visibly and his frown loosened a bit. Pretending to be unaware of the change on the half-demon’s face, Miroku continued: “You’re the one who piloted a _Jaeger_ to Korea solo!”

If that man started to squeak like a fangirl he swore he wouldn’t get the fuck out fast enough. The plane was still somewhere behind him, surely he could still jump inside and somehow get the damn thing to fly… couldn’t he?

Seeing as Miroku was waiting for him to say something, he sighed and confirmed the man’s affirmation:

 “More like crashed a _Jaeger_ in some Korean beach… and I’m not doing it ever again” he quickly added. “I was almost dead when someone found me…”

“The _Pan Pacific Defense Corps_ left you for dead” Miroku stated, but when he saw Inuyasha’s face, the man rushed to change the topic. “Well! Giving the fact that you were here before, I assume you know your way around…”

“Yeah.”

“Good! Everything it’s pretty much the same as it was then…” he stopped at the door to let him past first and then followed him inside. “After I show you to your room, we could start introducing you to the workers and crews. Oh! And there’s a certain someone you need to see… I’m sure you’ll remember him.”

Inuyasha cocked an eyebrow:

“Who?”

“A-ah! It’s a surprise!” Miroku beamed.

…

After leaving his bag on his new room –and having a quick much needed shower because he still felt the dampness of Mexico clinging to his skin–. Inuyasha followed Miroku around the Shatterdome, making himself familiar again with all the facilities he used to know so well. It hadn’t changed one bit in all those years, at least not the buildings or the organization of the place.

The difference was, however, the people.

Kaede had said that there were few who still remembered him from before and Miroku had also blurted something about someone he would want to meet again. Still, all those faces, all those scents and sounds were new to him, a really big amount of people of different species and races: he saw men and woman from all over the world and he was completely sure he had smelled a couple of demons but as much as he looked around, he saw nothing more than unknown people. Gold eyes scanned everything and everyone only to get more and more frustrated each passing moment. But really, what was he looking for? The only person he would gladly see again wasn’t there anymore. Nor there nor anywhere else.

And he was the only one to blame.

His own resolution seemed to have left him as soon as he got out of the plane.

Why had he decided to come back?

“I don’t believe me own eyes” said a voice from the other side of the hangar, a voice that sounded faint to Miroku’s ears but perfectly clear to Inuyasha’s inhuman ones. “Ya should be dead, lad. That’s the only excuse for not showing yer face in thirty years!”

The voice belonged to a bug-eyed demon with a grey goatee and long mustache. One could think that it was a cruelty to have such a skinny and wrinkly old man working there, but if the giant hammer he carried on his shoulder was any indication of it, the demon was full of energy.

“Tôtôsai!” grinned Inuyasha, and went to him, yet again leaving Miroku behind. “You still alive, old man?”

“I’ve never been more alive, brat” Tôtôsai greeted, and patted the half-demon’s shoulder with a bony hand. “What’s the _craic_ , kid?”

“Not much. Been here and there…” he shrugged putting his hands into his pockets. “What about you? How come you’re still here?”

“Ireland is too quiet for me now…” the demon smiled. “They still need Good Ol’ Me here and even if I’m knackered at the end of every day, I’m still having a whale of a time!”

Just as Miroku reached them, Inuyasha started to laugh hard.

“Decades knowing you and I’m still don’t know what the fuck are you saying…”

The J-Tech Chief stopped shortly to catch his breath and straightened himself again:

“So you already knew Tôtôsai…” he began. “Then you’ll be very pleased to know that…”

“Here, kid” Tôtôsai broke in pointing with his thumb at something at his back. “I’m sure you’re dying to see him again…”

Ignoring the way Miroku huffed and muttered something along the lines of ‘stop interrupting me’, Inuyasha followed the direction of the finger and found himself incapable of closing his mouth.

His eyes lit up with a flame that hadn’t been there for thirty years and a big grin lit up his face like a lighthouse.

“Whoa…” was the only thing that he could say.

There was a _Jaeger_ beside the old engineer, one that seemed perfectly functional despite of its evident lack of use. It was bright red with golden lines running along arms and legs, and drawing patterns across its chest.

“You rebuilt it!”

To Miroku’s surprise and Tôtôsai’s deference, the half-demon jumped to the shoulder of the machine and planted both hands on the glass, trying to peek inside the cockpit, amazed. Then, he beamed towards them like a child on Christmas morning.

“It’s better than ever!” he shouted, and then he pressed his forehead to the gigantic metal helmet. “Hello there, _Fang_. I missed you…”

“Is he always like this?” Miroku found himself asking the same thing twice in one day.

The old demon scratched his head and shrugged.

“And worse. Wait up ‘til he’s inside…”

Inuyasha landed beside them, still taking in all the _Jaeger_ ’s bulk.

“Who’s piloting him?” he asked and Tôtôsai arched an eyebrow.

“Who else buy you, lad?” he answered. “When do you want me to start bringin’ it to life?”

Surely he was waiting for an immediate response, and order to start right now and a big bone-crushing hug –although he could live without that one–, but instead was rewarded with a pregnant silence. The smile disappeared from Inuyasha’s face as if it was never there and was replaced by a scowl, a clenched jaw and closed fists disappearing inside the sleeves of his _haori_.

“What?” asked Tôtôsai, truly confused.

“You should give him to someone else” muttered Inuyasha. “A _Jaeger_ as good as _Steel Fang_ shouldn’t be sitting here unused.”

Tôtôsai gaped for a moment and then shook his head to get out of his stupor:

“Unused? Kid, what the hell are you saying?”

No one had the chance to add more: a siren went off and the gates opened to let in another _Jaeger_ , a bright blue model that Inuyasha remembered seeing on the news a few years after his disappearance.

“Oh, for God’s sake, not now!” the old demon grunted. Pointing a bony finger to Inuyasha’s face, he said: “We’ll talk about this. No-one is going to step inside _Fang_ if you’re not on board, so get your head out of yer ass already!”

As fast as his skinny legs allowed him –which was a lot regarding his age and appearance–, Tôtôsai disappeared from their side and reappeared at the platform, waiting to take care of the newly arrived machine.

“Oh, good!” greeted Miroku. “ _Koyukon Wolf_ is back!”

Yeah, he knew that _Jaeger_. It was all over the news whenever he managed to get anywhere near a radio or a TV.

Forgetting for a moment the weight that had settled in his stomach after Tôtôsai’s words, Inuyasha walked beside Miroku to watch how the _Jaeger_ crew went out of the cockpit.

The first one to jump outside was a demon, he could’ve sworn it; no human was capable of jumping from that height and land unscathed over the dock platform. When he took off his helmet his long jet black hair, kept up in a long ponytail, slipped out of it and his sharp blue eyes, much colder than Miroku’s calm ponds, scanned the crowd with satisfaction. He was strangely tanned for a man whose uniform consisted on a full suit that covered every bit of skin.

As an answer to the cheering crowd, the pilot shook a fist up in the air,

“ _Gokurakuchô_ is dead!” he proclaimed, and the crowd roared.

“That’s Kôga” Miroku pointed before Inuyasha could ask who the fuck was that pretentious punk. “He’s our best pilot.”

That delivered a new pang of nostalgia to Inuyasha’s heart: he used to be the best pilot of the _Y.N.J.I._

Yeah, “was” was the key word there…

Why had he decided to come back?

A camera flashed and Kôga smiled cockily showing his sharp fangs with pride.

Inuyasha was about to ask if that wolf demon –once he took off his helmet there was no way of hiding his smell– piloted solo when a smaller figure jumped out of the cockpit and took off his helmet.

“That one is human” he stated instantly. “Kaede- _baba_ wasn’t lying then… you’re still with the _Yokai-Ningen_ initiative. Why do you hire teenagers?”

The shorter pilot was a rather young looking boy with sand-brown hair and a gentle smile on his pale face that apparently had earned him a good amount of all the coos and whistles of the females within the crowd. Not as many as those who still looked at Kôga, but close enough.

“That’s Hojô” explained Miroku. “And he’s not a teenager, he’s twenty two.”

“Twenty two? He looks like fucking fifteen to me…”

Miroku shrugged and shook his head.

“Well… yeah. He seems pretty young.”

Inuyasha was waiting for a second part in that sentence, something along the lines of ‘he’s young but he kills _kaiju_ like the absolute best’ or even ‘Don’t say that to his face, he would break your every bone’ but nothing came. Miroku surely knew what crossed his mind, because he grimaced a bit and gave him an apologetic smile.

“Is the first time he goes inside a _Jaeger_ ” he revealed. “Kôga’s first companion abandoned him after a nasty fight. They finished the _kaiju_ , but they were very close to death and… that guy chickened out on him. Hojô may not be the bravest or strongest of us all, but surely he’s loyal. And apparently, Kôga is ok with that.”

He looked to his companion to watch his reaction but he found out Inuyasha was no longer listening to him, his golden eyes wide open as if he had seen a ghost.

“Inuyasha?” he whispered, but the half-demon didn’t hear him.

Beside one of the _Jaeger_ ’s gigantic feet, waiting patiently for the two pilots to get down, were two women.

The tallest one had her dark brown hair up in a tidy ponytail that left a parted fringe over her forehead. She was wearing green cargo pants with a black jumper, and had the stance of a soldier waiting for orders. The other one…

“Who is she?” the question left his lips without him even realizing it.

It wasn’t possible… was it?

“Her name is Sango” Miroku answered. “And she’s the most beautiful woman on earth. Unfortunately, she’s not interested in anything that keeps her from her job. She’s in charge of the gym, you see? Her father was one big shot here a few years ago, an Australian colonel if I recall correctly. That’s why she’s…”

“Not the upright one, idiot, the other. The black haired one.”

The black haired one with pale skin and gentle features. The black haired one whose dark locks curved around her shoulders like a mantle.

The black haired one who looked exactly as…

His heart almost gave out when the girl suddenly turned to them. Nudging her friend, she waved a hand at them. All the similarities vanished the second those full lips opened in a bright smile; _she_ never smiled, never. And ever if she did for some unfathomable reason, it was never so wide and full of light.

“You mean Miss Kagome? She’s one of our new local promises.” Beside him, Miroku returned the gesture by waving his own bandaged hand. Both girls were watching them now, and the one he had called Sango was mouthing something and signaling them to come closer. “She’s been with us for nearly five years now. Why this sudden interest? Do you want me to introduce y…?

He soon realized he was talking alone; Inuyasha was already near the opposite gate, the one that supported a giant war clock that counted slowly minutes, hours and days. It read: 00d. 00h. 37m.

Miroku sighed and shrugged apologetically to the girls.

…

Inuyasha slammed the door closed and fell face first on his bed.

“Fuck” he muttered, and rolled over to his back until golden eyes pierced the ceiling. “Fuck… why the hell…?”

He grunted and covered his face with both hands.

Barely twenty four hours ago, he was a worker of the Wall in Mexico and now he was back in Tokyo feeling as out of place as ever.

Why had he decided to come back?

Everyone he knew from back then were gone. Sure, Kaede and Tôtôsai were still there but it wasn’t enough. For every sense of familiarity with that place came a pang of uneasiness, a feeling of misplacement and a rush of painful memories he couldn’t get rid of.

Yeah, apparently Kaede, whom he had known since she was a teenager, didn’t hold any grudges. The forgiveness of that woman was truly amazing, but she only reminded him of someone else… and of what he did. And Tôtôsai was still a crazy strange Irishman that used so much slang for Inuyasha to fully understand him, but he could no longer be his mechanic; no, _Fang_ would never be his _Jaeger_ again, despite all the work both of them had put on the mecha and all the old demon’s effort to rebuild it. Besides, they had another “best pilot” to protect the Earth so why was he needed there?

That guy… Miroku… he could get along with him but why did he look up to him like he was some king of hero? He was pretty damn sure he wasn’t, in fact he was the epitome of the antihero. And soon everyone would discover it and…

Oh, and then there was that girl… She had the same face. _Her_ same face. The same fucking face! He had enough with her memory, why the gods –if there was any, a belief that abandoned him long ago– had put her in his way? To torment him?

Why had he decided to come back?

Sometime during his brooding, a light rapping on his door brought him back to reality. At first, he didn’t move, hoping for whoever it was to give up and go away, but the knocking repeated itself.

“Umm... hello?”

That was a woman. A young woman judging by her voice. Annoyed and more intrigued than he dare to admit, Inuyasha got on his feet and opened the door.

“What?” he spat, but almost chocked on his own spit when he took in the figure that awaited him at the other side.

The girl that Miroku had addressed as Kagome stood there with a shy but impossibly warm smile on her face.

“Inuyasha, isn’t it?” she greeted, stretching a hand in his direction. “I’m Higurashi Kagome, I live in front of you.”

While the girl pointed back to the door across his own, Inuyasha simply stared at her with a cocked eyebrow, one hand on the doorframe, the other still gripping the knob.

“Should I know you?” He blurted harshly.

The girl’s smile faltered but didn’t disappeared. Her hand remained stubbornly still, the open palm ready to accept his.

“We -my friend Sango and I- saw you and Miroku back at the hangars. He told us you were new and I… I just wanted to say hello and…” his scowl made her stutter a bit, but didn’t stopped her at all; she seemed to be one of these people who considered themselves in charge of making the new kid in school feel welcome. “Well, welcome to the Tokyo Shatterdome anyway!”

Golden eyes looked finally into soft chestnut ones and his cocked eyebrow went back to framing his face as its twin. Her hand opened a bit more and the smile returned full force…

… Only to be washed away from her face when the door slammed in her nose, almost bruising it. Kagome took a surprised step back, swaying slightly after recovering her balance.

“Hey!” she cried, more out of surprise than anger; that came not much later­: “I was talking to you, you ill-mannered brute!” She slammed her hand against the door two times for good measure. “I was just trying to be kind!”

“Leave me the fuck alone, girl” came the answer from the inside.

And that was all she got from the “new kid”. Her words –calling them shouts would be more like it– and hits make no difference: the door remained closed and she couldn’t heard anything more from the inhabitant of that room. Finally, she gave up; delivering a final kick to the door, she traversed the corridor to her room and slammed the door much like he had done.

The corridor was left empty and, behind each door, frustration made two different people to fall flat on their beds, him on his back, her burying her face in her pillow.

 _What an asshole_. She thought, and shook her head to free herself of the feeling that she had just made a fool of herself.

 _Fuck._  He thought, his eyes fixated to the ceiling through his fingers that had returned to his face once more. _Why the fuck did I ever thought coming back was a good idea?_

Suddenly, he was unable to respond himself.

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In situ = Latin from “on the place” or “on the same place”.  
> Gokurakuchô = Japanese for “Paradise Bird”. You know, the ones that were the arch-enemies of Kôga’s pack back in the anime and manga.


End file.
